Category: South America 2023

We started our trip home from Chile with a flight that left Santiago at 11:55 pm. So we had a whole day to continue exploring Santiago before we left.

We started the day at our nearby coffee shop, The people there were incredibly friendly. They remembered us and the coffee and croissants were some of the best of the trip.

After we checked out of our hotel at noon and stored our bags we took the hop on hop off bus tour of the city. We got to see the newer and more modern eastern part of Santiago.

We got off the bus at Plaza de La Constitución and had a late lunch at a cafe called Blue Jar.

When we got back to the hotel and reclaimed our bags they arranged a car to take us to the airport. At the airport we killed time until we could check in at around 8pm. We had sandwiches and beer and finally right at midnight we were on our way.

I can’t say I would recommend American Airlines given the quality of their food and service but after a ten hour flight, a 6 hour layover in Dallas, and an almost 4 hour flight to Reno we arrived home safe and sound. We are recovering from our red eye flight and getting over our jet lag.

It was a wonderful trip. I uploaded our YouTube video of Iguazu Falls just before we left Santiago. I’ll be editing YouTube videos for a while so please watch Boomers Without Borders for more videos.

Today the weather was perfect in Santiago. This morning we had coffee at the same coffee shop where we had coffee yesterday.

Then we walked to the Nobel prize winning Chilean poet, Pablo Marisa’s home, La Chascona.

We took the audio tour. I enjoyed the tour. It was an interesting place but it also gave us a perspective of Chile’s recent history.

Next we took the funicular to the statue of the Virgin Mary that overlooks Santiago. From there we rode the cable down and back we had great views of Santiago and the surrounding mountains.

From the bottom of the funicular we went looking for a jazz club we might eat at tonight. The club we were looking for appeared to be closed so we walked back to our hotel.

We had a great dinner at Casaluz Restaurant not far from where we ate last night on Avenida Italia.

This morning we found a wonderful little coffee shop near our hotel and had coffee and croissants.

Then we walked towards the Plaza de Armas. Last time we were in Chile in 2019 we only spent one night in Santiago on our way home and we stayed near the airport because there was civil unrest and there were violent demonstrations in the center of Santiago . As we walked along the main street today a lot of buildings were boarded up and others had closable metal shutters and doors. We hypothesized that this was because of the riots.

We walked around the center for a while.

We wanted some lunch and just happened to find a little restaurant very near Palacio de La Moneda. They offered a menu of the day that was very good. We started with squash soup for Duke and Ham rolled around avocado for me. Then I had tongue and Duke had chicken breast. For desert I had banana and with carmel sauce and Duke had flan. The meal for the two of us was about $19.

We took the metro back to our hotel and then napped.

Tonight we went to a jazz club about a 20 minute walk from our hotel in the Italian District. We had dinner and enjoyed a great show at the Jazz Corner.

Blog post for Monday, 6 November, 2023

It was pouring rain this morning when we drove from Frutillar to the Airport in Puerto Montt.

Our flight to Santiago left at about 2 pm and took about 2 hours. We said good bye to Bonnie and Brian at the airport in Santiago. They fly home tonight. Duke and I took a taxi to our hotel in central Santiago.

For dinner Duke and I ate at a Peruvian restaurant near our hotel, Olan. Duke had fish and I had shrimp.

Blog post for Sunday, 5 November, 2023

Tomorrow we fly from Puerto Montt to Santiago so today we drove back south towards Puerto Montt to Frutillar which is less than an hours drive from Puerto Montt airport.

At breakfast this morning a Chimango Caracara bird sat right outside our table and eyed our food and us. I can only identify it because we took pictures. And I used the Merlin bird ID app.

After breakfast we drove down the road a bit and did the waterfall hike that we missed yesterday. It was raining but the hike takes you through the spray from the waterfall so we hardly noticed. A friendly, polite, exuberant dog led us the whole way.

We stopped a couple of times along our way south to stretch our legs. At one stop some Sunday kayakers we’re just packing up.

In Frutillar our B&B overlooks the lake. If it weren’t so gray and overcast I think we would have a great view of the volcano at the end of the lake.

Frutillar has a strong German influence. We had to check out the Kuchen shop just down the street

For dinner we had a wonderful meal at Colonos del Lago, a short walk from our B&B.

I have to say that I have never before had lamb like the lamb we have had in Chile and Argentina. It has been fabulous!

While we we’re waiting for our food Bonnie and I had to test out the piano across the street.